Testing the Sleep-Heads and the Awakening

When assessing the sleep-heads silkworms just entering their dormant molting stage, a body that is firm and solid, appearing dark green when held up to the light, indicates they are free of disease. If they are limp, stretched out, and reddish-yellow in color, then they are ill. When gathering the sleep-heads, if the mulberry leaves are sparse and dry and the sand-mats (沙茵); the bedding layer consisting of silkworm excrement and leaf remnants are firm and clumped together, they are healthy. If the leaves are sparse but damp and the waste stains the hands, they are diseased.

A popular folk method involves taking a bowl of clear water and selecting ten sleep-heads. After thoroughly cleaning away the foot-binding silk original: "chan jiao si" (纒脚絲); the silk the worm spins to anchor itself to a surface before molting from them, drop them into the water. If all ten sink, it signifies a perfect harvest; if nine sink, it is a ninety-percent harvest, and so on in descending order. Although this is not necessarily an absolute rule, it can be kept as a useful method of trial.

As for the awakening original: "qi niang" (起孃); the process of waking and rising after the molt is complete, those that have just molted and resemble a horse with its head held high and its tail spread, with a color like "mutton-fat jade" a high-quality, creamy white jade, are healthy. If the head droops, the tail is tucked, and the body is yellow like the color of "old storehouse rice," the common folk call this "wearing a yellow grass-cloth shirt." Once these are given leaves to eat, green fluid will immediately leak from their tails.

For fire-raised silkworms silkworms raised in rooms where charcoal fires are used to maintain warmth, one must place a sheet of fresh white paper in the basket. If the silkworms wake and rise together on the paper without leaving a single speck of filth or water marks, they are in good condition. If there are marks, it is a sign of "heat injury" damage caused by excessive or uneven heat from the warming fires, and it is acceptable to discard them.

Thinning the Crowded Trays

original: "fen yong" (分廱); literally "dividing the swelling," referring to the practice of reducing the density of silkworms in a tray to prevent disease and ensure even growth